Essentials of Digital IC Test (DS356)

SynopsisIn this course, the participant will be introduced to basic digital and DC testing on an IC. This course is meant to be platform-independent, insofar as it focuses on the test development environment, a typical tester and its instruments, testing theory and how an IC and its test program are collectively brought from engineering to high volume production.

What You Will Learn

• The test development process / environment
• ICs and their test equipment in the marketplace
• The anatomy of a typical ATE (automated test equipment)
• Digital and DC test basics
• Moving an IC from engineering development into sustainable production

Who Should Attend

• Production-support floor staffs who want to upgrade their engineering knowledge
• Test program developers
• Test engineers
• Product engineers who want to know more about test

PrerequisiteBasic knowledge of and experience with

• digital logic
• a programming language of sorts
• digital and DC test and bench measurement equipment (e.g. logic analyzer, basic instruments)

Course MethodologyThis course is presented classroom style, with demonstrations to illustrate the concepts taught.

Course Duration2 days, 9am - 5pm

Course StructureHigh-Level Test Development Process
EDA tools, bench development and debugging, ATE test development, correlation process (ATE to bench), pilot and QA production, sustainable high volume production.

Parties involved: IC designer, product engineer, test engineer, load board designer, production support. Their typical roles and how they interact to make the process successful and smooth.

Equipment on a High Level
The test cell
The ATE
Handler
Types of devices that are tested in the industry

1. Digital (e.g. FPGAs, microprocessors)
2. Baseband mixed signal (Codecs, DACs, ADCs)
3. RF ICs (amplifiers, mixers, transceivers, etc.)
4. Power management / battery management ICs (PMICs)
5. SOCs (combination of all of the above - like in a dedicated cell phone)

Diving into the ATE Hardware
The anatomy of an ATE
Infrastructure

1. Mainframe / card cages
2. Backplane
3. Cooling system
4. Modules / cards and filling order
5. Test head
6. The DUT interface board and sockets
7. Concept of pin density

Digital and DC hardware

1. Digital pin electronics - digital measurement architecture
2. Device power supplies
3. Precision measuring units (per-pin PMUs)

Software architecture

1. Low level APIs and firmware
2. Module / instrument drivers
3. High level languages like C / C++
4. Scripting languages
5. Setups for digital devices
6. The test program

Digital Test Techniques and Basics
DC testing (using primarily the per-pin PMU or the system PMU)

• Continuity (aka open and shorts)
• Various types of DC tests - typical tests include: VOH/IOH, VOL/IOL, input leakage / IO leakage, IDD (static and dynamic), bias tests, crystal-related measurements

Functional test

• Why we do functional tests
• How a functional test is set up
• Various DC tests that have their functional counterparts: open and shorts via functional method, various types of functional tests (open / shorts, VOL/VOH, IOL,/IOH, JTAG)
• Functional tests vs DC tests - when to use which?

AC tests

• Propagation delay
• Frequency tests
• Hold time

Power up and power down sequencing

• The process of powering up and powering down a device before / after test

Offline Demo on the T2000 System Software (TSS)
The basic construct of a tester operating system
How a test program is generically set up (using the T2000 as a reference)
The software tool set that is available for DC/digital debug
Test program flow / execution and binning